This is the approach Pimax has chosen repeatedly and I guess they are okay with it, negative review fallout and all. I just hope it is a conscious decision and they are not completely surprised time and again that users give negative reviews if some of the features you advertised don’t work at all or well.
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Yeah, maybe they just don’t see an issue as they have been successful to date. I suppose if they were to wait for everything to be ready it would be possibly next year before anything released and that would probably be financially unfeasible.
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I think part of it is they want to stay relevant and give the impression that any day now (soon™) they’ll have a ready product. Let’s keep those potential buyers pulling the carriage by holding a carrot above their heads.
If they were to say nothing since Nov 2, 2022 and just do the CES2023 even, it may have been better.
Given the state of the product at a lot of the roadshows, the lens mix-ups (which still seem to be plaguing them til this day), the controller issues, the missing features… Well. I really don’t think it did them a lot of favors except to generate hype and try to spin it as positive as they could.
But reality is different.
There needs to be independent reviews of the CURRENT state of the product and what they have left to do to meet their advertised specs, as well as complete/test the remaining missing features.
*I’m thumbing down my own post just so I can be the first one to do it! 
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Spot on, I’m sure this is exactly their reasoning. They must be thinking that any sale that goes to Varjo is a lost sale to them, so that’s why they’re continually holding those carrots in front of people interest in the Pimax products. Very well said
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It seems to me like it’s an engineer’s approach. It’s not good to send it to YouTube influencers in an unfinished .It’s not good to send it to YouTube influencers in a unfinished state state, but if they send it to the right people who can actually help them make the product better in the long run, that’s not a bad thing in and of itself
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Agree mostly. Perhaps we feel the same way.
Though, for me, I feel they as a company have a certain level of responsibility to perform their own internal testing of the features and their intended functionality.
Get those features working and proven to a high degree. THEN, go out to beta testers externally under NDA to get more objective eyes on the product to help work out the small wrinkles/kinks.
My Spock right eyebrow raises up when I’ve seen what they’ve been doing at times…
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You had an aero, how was it if it weren’t for the dead pixels?
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Excellent clarity, things looked really defined. FOV horizontal was acceptable, vertical it was low. Really comfy and compact. Felt a really well made headset but obviously had issues with QC/QA given the dead pixel problem. I’d still pick a Crystal now between the 2 even if I could guarantee an Aero without dead pixels.
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Good video but was hoping she had one herself, surprised that she hasn’t yet but a much smaller youtuber has (his review is coming next week).
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Well, I’m excited about the Crystal, but I’m an FOV-snob. I really don’t want to return it given that there will be improvements, but the 15-day return policy puts me in a spot where I will probably return it out of fear. I mean pixels can die on day 16.
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I don’t think Pimax has had a dead pixel problem like Varjo had (things may have improved since then, certainly in the Varjo discord there’s less talk of it). I’m hesitant about my Crystal order atm because support said they won’t replace a Crystal with dead pixels without photos+video as proof. I tried obtaining such proof with my Aero and couldn’t manage it - Varjo replaced my Aero anyway (and Meta have done the same with a Quest 2).
Is that Pimax’s policy, a 15 day return window? Edit: just checked and yes that is the policy, but they deduct shipping cost and face foam cost, about $100. Plus it says the Crystal must be “unused” but i’ve seen that elsewhere, Varjo say the same, but people were returning them having tried them. I guess they must be in pristine condition i.e. no scratches etc.
About getting a dead pixel after after the 15 days, isn’t that pretty rare? I’ve never experienced that personally, have read about it here and there, but it seems dead pixels being present are more common when the headsets are new.
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Oh, it’s not that I expect different FOV between native and PP - it should be about the same, but about knowing what the native (per-eye) frustum looks like, which also gives how the left and right native frustums overlap when in the sweet spot, and how the HMD should be worn to attain the sweet spot.
For the Crystal, with its round lenses, I do kind of expect the native frustum to be fully symmetrical (although that is not a given), which incidently means you could probably deduce the canting from the PP FOV… actually, hang on, I might as well scroll back and check… Yep: 51.65 lateral and 41.65 medial; That would more than likely mean 5° canting, IF nothing else restricts FOV (for example physical space for the display panels, where they bump up against one another, or a full-height cut edge in the lens, to make room for the user’s nose) – same as Valve Index, and half that of the 8k/5k series, meaning something like 10-to-11-ish percent more pixels on the X axis, than native, for equal image quality…
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I would just like to point out to Pimax something about the cable.
We now know the 3 in One cable can’t be used with the Crystal due to it power deficiency. So they’re going back to the 2 in One cable with an external power adapter.
But on the website it still states 3 in one as included.
Which is this one
And it’s only 4.5 meters not 5, unless they’ve made a longer one.
Probably not a big deal but Pimax needs to clarify.
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Keep in mind the store page is likely behind on updating vs the updates being released. Different departments.
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I think Pimax has the short return window to try to discourage returns, but I’m convinced that it probably increases the number of returns instead. Especially with the way Pimax VR headsets tend to be a bumpy ride at first until you get them all sorted out. The amount of time it takes to do that is often longer than their return window.
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Sorry I was just trying to express my fears, not that such a thing is likely.
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I really can’t agree more. That’s exactly how I feel.
Hmm. My understanding based on what SweViver said during the MTTV livestream is that reviewers were in line behind the beta testers and would likely not get their Crystals until later… I’d be surprised if any YouTuber gets one next week. If they do, I sure hope it’s got all issues sorted.
Otherwise we’ll be off on the merry-go-round again.
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